by Ed Ifkovic
As the car pulled into the driveway of the mansion, I spotted a tiny man standing in the open doorway. It had to be Tobias—he looked as if he’d toppled from a Mayflower gangplank. Dressed in a severe black suit with black tie, arms folded across his chest, he looked the undertaker at a viewing. Or one of the Salem judges.
A compact little man, wizened, with a drab oval face, he blinked his eyes nervously, glanced back and forth from George to me, as though uncertain where to focus. This squirrel of a man stepped back, grinned foolishly, showing stained yellow teeth, and led us into a drawing room.
Massive mahogany furniture from another century, dark and forbidding, filled the large space so that walking a straight line was impossible. I wove my uncertain way around clunky claw-footed tables and brocaded sofas, past overstuffed ottomans and knickknack-cluttered bookshelves, my fingers grazing old-fashioned, yellowed antimacassars draped over the backs of chairs. A provincial museum, I considered, a room that stopped in time when Victoria died and Edward stumbled onto the royal throne. That was it, I realized: It was all so…British. Colonial. Imperial. Fussy. Here was Prince Albert’s specter, the puritanical consort, bowing us in.
“Clorinda is tied up at the Assembly temple,” he informed us. “Regrettable, I’m afraid. But she’ll be here shortly. Being the preeminent spiritual leader on the East Coast has its liabilities.”
I glanced at George. He was staring, open-mouthed, at a stuffed wolverine placed, lifelike, on a mantel. A taxidermist’s catastrophe, to be sure, its fur matted and faded. Worse, its glass eyes had shifted in the sockets so that the poor animal looked wall-eyed, one eye facing the Atlantic Ocean and the other the Pacific. Keeping an eye on all of America. George kept nodding his head at me like a dizzy schoolboy, compelling me to look at the monstrosity, but I’d already taken in the hideous décor, this anachronistic space that stunned conversation.
George and I sat on a lumpy sofa, opposite the little man.
“We’ve looked forward to meeting the famous Clorinda,” George said without a trace of sarcasm, still not diverting his eyes from that sad animal.
An old woman plodded in, dressed in a frumpy black-and-white maid’s uniform, and clumsily placed a tray of biscuits and cookies before us. A pitcher of iced lemonade rested next to them, slivers of bright yellow lemon floating on the surface.
“This is Hilda.” Tobias indicated the matronly woman who merely grunted. She maneuvered her ancient self around the cluttered room with admirable dexterity.
“She’s wonderful.” Tobias watched her retreating back. “We inherited her from a woman in Newark, where she’d been a faithful domestic since coming from Sweden ages ago. Clorinda’s a loving spiritual woman, but she can be a demanding taskmaster. She demands a smoothly run household. Hilda can read our minds. I simply sit in my study and work on my book.”
“Your book?” George said too loudly.
“A study of all the foods and herbs mentioned in the Bible and their symbolic implications…”
Neither George nor I said anything.
“Will Dak be joining us for dinner?” I broke in.
He shook his head vigorously. “No, his mother thought it best if he not be here. Just us, discussing this…this unpleasant development. That horrendous murder that, I fear, might tarnish the good work of our Assembly of God.” He looked toward the window as though expecting a stone to be tossed through the glass. “So she’s sent them—Dakota and Annika—off to visit parishioners over to South Orange.”
I struggled to create a sentence. For a minute we sat in silence. George kept making a clicking noise, unhappy. Finally, I sputtered, “Tell me about your Assembly of God.”
“You’ve heard of it, of course.”
“Of course.” I hadn’t, to be sure, but thought it best to agree. There was a reason for this summons and I needed to hear it.
His voice got low, solemn. “When I found Jesus, I realized how I’d best spend the vast monies I didn’t do anything to earn. In my middle age, wandering, a lost soul, I sought an answer from God. A pilgrim adrift in America listening to street-corner prophets.” A sweet smile. “It took a long time coming, let me tell you.”
George was smiling. “I’d have thought God would send messages more quickly. He seems to control the phone lines.”
Tobias narrowed his eyes, disapproving. “You’re having fun with me, Mr. Kaufman. That’s quite all right. That’s your job.”
George sat back, amused.
Tobias went on. “A number of years back I had to be in California and I chanced upon Aimee Semple McPherson’s Angelus Temple. A magnificent woman, that one, inspired.” He breathed in and bowed his head. “That changed my life. A year later, hunting down a revival service in Buffalo, the night of a raging snowstorm, I chanced upon Clorinda’s service. Here it was, a dark night with impassable roads, Buffalo as a howling wilderness out of the Old Testament, and yet this ramshackle rented Sons of Pythias hall was jam-packed with devout souls—farmers, mechanics, soldiers, housewives, all breathing the ethereal air of Jesus Christ. And Clorinda, magnificent in rainbow-colored robes and with a voice tinkling like crystal, took us all up to God’s kingdom.” He half-rose from his seat and grabbed his heart. “A year later I begged her to marry me.”
“And you moved here?” From George, with only the mildest tinge of disbelief.
“It’s Clorinda’s childhood home. Maplewood, and her long-held dream of bringing Jesus back with her. The foundation of an empire would start here. Since her early days as an itinerant preacher traveling the hinterland in a broken-down bus, begging for quarters to print her devout messages, at one point with little Dakota tucked at her side and saying her prayers, she’d longed for permanence.”
“The Assembly of God,” I said.
“Exactly. A magnificent shrine to God, patterned after Aimee Semple McPherson’s Angelus Temple. So here we are. Jesus comes to Jersey. Since I built Clorinda’s temple, her reputation has swelled. Like high tide. Massive, massive. A sanctuary, my friends. A place of old-fashioned morality and rectitude. Look out the window at the world. What do you see? Sin and frivolity and orgies and drinking and smoking and profane love. And now the ugly specter of war in Europe. This is because we’ve stepped away from Christ. The Bible burned. Lost lives. Jonathan Edwards, who thundered at sinners in the hands of an angry God, dangled them over the pits of hell, once traveled from New England to New Jersey, and died with his message. Fire and brimstone—the true meaning of the Bible. Not the namby-pamby soft-center close-your-eyes-to-sin that passes for religion in some quarters these days. Oh no! Here, again, there is a live revival in Maplewood. The Old Testament lives and breathes.”
George grunted. “Alexandria, Athens, Rome, London, Maplewood.”
“Indeed!” Tobias beamed. “Clorinda is the world’s most loving woman, charity itself, a blessing. A beautiful creature. I never married until my fifties because God had me wait for perfection.”
George choked on a cookie.
He went on. “The church and Clorinda are one. A rich legacy.” His face then scrunched up, worried. “Do you see why I invited you?”
That jarred. “Ah, Tobias, I don’t see…”
“Dakota is like a son to me, Miss Ferber. A fitful, wayward teenage boy when I met him, hell-bent, rebellious, a dreamer. But I knew—Clorinda convinced me—that God’s master plan meant he’d be prodigal, a temporary wastrel, a gifted lad who would finally extend the power and the glory of the Assembly of God. We’d branch out from Maplewood—to Newark, to New York, New England—to the West.”
“Does Dak want this path?” I tried to make eye contact.
He squinted at me. “It’s not his choice. Would you defy God, Miss Ferber?”
George rocked in his chair. “Edna likes a good challenge. She’d take on God if He insulted her.”
“That’s why this murder nonsense must be
squelched. Dakota told me that you”—he stared into my eyes—“favor him, trust him, understand his innocence. You can be his advocate.”
“Well, I do think he’s incapable of murder, but…”
He spoke over my words. “I’m not a worldly man, Miss Ferber. Nor is Clorinda. Though we surround ourselves with grand worldly trappings, possessions do keep so many from touching God. We’re sheltered from so much. There is so much I do not understand. I invited you because we wanted to voice our approval of your friendship with Dakota. Your comforting support. I know you have no power to stem the inquiries of that foolish Constable Biggers, who lingers outside the temple with a pad in hand, watching, though I don’t know what for. But I suspect he has chosen Dakota as murderer. So Annika tells us. Preposterous. And dangerous to our church. All I’m asking is that you”—he faltered, struggled—“I don’t know…”
“Find the real murderer?” George tossed in.
A beautiful glow covered the tiny man. “That would be nice.”
“I’ll befriend Dakota, but…”
My voice broke off as the door opened and his wife rushed in.
Clorinda Roberts Tyler made an entrance that reminded me of an imperious Ethel Barrymore stepping before the footlights, pausing, expecting the roar of spontaneous applause. A moment purposely out of sync with the script—but did it matter? She was the blazing star in the night firmament. So, too, Clorinda paused, a quixotic smile on her lips, her hand fluttering in the air as though warding off pesky mosquitoes.
You saw a slight, slender woman, a willowy reed, whose velvety olive complexion and large stunning eyes immediately reminded me of her son, Dakota. A youthful woman, graceful, with her long dark hair flowing over her shoulders, covered with a black lace mantilla. As she moved, the diaphanous pink dress she wore flowed like gossamer. Eye-catching, mesmerizing, haunting—a woman in full possession. No makeup, not a trace of lipstick or rouge or powder, but the effect of that mobile face was one of utter glamour and appeal. Yet, when she passed under the overhead light, the actress understanding her spot, you caught the reflection of brilliant diamonds on her earlobes and gracing her neck: an angel in jewels, the sylvan sprite accented with top-drawer Tiffany jewels. Astounding!
She nodded to George and then to me, fluttering, gushing, inordinately pleased that we would visit, thrilled to meet such luminaries, renowned cosmopolites so far removed from her humdrum spiritual hideaway.
“I have fame but I don’t have genius,” she told us.
Tobias begged to differ. “Clorinda, your genius is the voice of God within you.”
I wondered how long this nincompoopism would last and whether I’d survive a full evening of their simplistic rapture. Already George was tapping a finger nervously on the arm of his chair and making gurgling noises.
“Dakota has mentioned you, my dear Edna. I must tell you he protested—yes, indeed—our invitation to you and George here, saying it would embarrass him, but I pooh-poohed that. An innocent boy, my Dakota.”
Hilda stood in the doorway and broke into the middle of Clorinda’s endless speech. “Dinner is ready.” Blunt, a little contemptuous. I supposed she tired of living in such rarefied atmosphere where the air got too thin and made breathing difficult. She turned away slowly, plodding back to the kitchen, one hand rubbing a hip.
“Come, come,” Clorinda cooed, and obediently we rose and followed her into the dining room where, under a blazing mother-of-pearl chandelier, the table was set for five.
“Another guest?” I asked.
Clorinda looked over her shoulder and dropped her voice. “My sister Ilona lives with us.” She pursed her lips. “She may or may not join us. Perhaps for dessert. She’s somewhat shy of folks, and unhappy.”
Unhappy: This last word was pronounced so deeply, melodramatically, that even Tobias smiled.
Glancing at Tobias through the rambling, uneventful dinner of overdone roast and soggy potatoes and anemic salad, I made one observation: Tobias sat quietly most of the meal while Clorinda rattled on about her Assembly of God and her destiny and her love of animals (though none was in evidence), and her love of literature (though not a book was in sight). I realized that what Dak had told me was true: There were two things—only two, emphatically two—that constituted Tobias’ world, a love of God and a love of Clorinda. Both seemed to have coalesced into one entity so his obsession was somehow monomaniacal. He stared at her with such rapt absorption that, at times, he held a fork in midair, entranced by a platitude he’d doubtless heard sail a hundred times from her lips. A little scary, this scene, for I suspected the battle of dual allegiances created some restless nights for the devout puritan. Or maybe not. The eternal feminine with the glow of God within. All very baffling to me, the secular Jewish nun of the Upper East Side. The Jewish slave girl on the ancient Nile, as I often referred to myself.
“Tobias has such a strong faith,” Clorinda was going on. “It fairly stuns. I am not worthy.”
“My dear, please.” He sighed. “But we must focus on solving our worldly dilemma now.”
I interrupted. “I appreciate your invitation, but I must tell you—I don’t know what I can do to help Dak.”
Both stopped, gobsmacked. Perhaps my tone was a little too cutting.
“Dakota,” Clorinda whispered.
“I know, I know.” I was frustrated. “But I’ve already said that I…”
Tobias looked at me closely. “Scandal.” His voice hummed the word, trembling. “Scandal. Awful scandal. Our church—my whole adult life, Miss Ferber—is predicated on what I deem one hundred percent morality. The ethical life. How else to lead our parishioners? The lost and saddened, the lonely, the misfits. Ours is a church of salvation after rigorous denial.” He glanced at his wife. “Since Dakota has returned from that…that sad sojourn in Hollywood and other wanderings throughout America, well, we, Clorinda and I, have embraced him as savior. When Clorinda and I are gone to our reward, Dakota and Annika must lead…”
“That’s an awful weight to thrust on one man.”
I sensed George nodding his head.
“He wants it.”
“Are you sure?” George asked.
“This Annika…” I began but stopped. The temperature in the sweltering room had become arctic.
“Murder will kill us.” Tobias spoke slowly, spacing out the words.
George smirked, then apologized. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled, “but it’s a…a wonderful line.”
Tobias’ face got scarlet and his voice trembled. “You mock us in a house of God’s servants.”
Clorinda was the pacifier. “Now, now, Tobias.” A dry chuckle. “Forget it. George is the jokester—that’s how he sees the world. His bread and butter. We see it differently. Ours is the bread of life.”
Tobias nodded and leaned toward me. “I believe the real murderer must be caught. And it will not be Dakota.”
Clorinda fussed, running her hand through her hair. “They should be looking at this Gus fellow. An evil man. Annika tells me he’s a godless Nazi.”
Tobias smiled and lovingly touched Clorinda’s hand. “That is why I wanted Miss Ferber here tonight. She agrees with us.”
Kindergarten exercises, I told myself: contentment found in throwaway words, answers grasped at as though they were golden rings on a child’s merry-go-round. Conversation that looped back around until every line was an echo of something said moments before.
George, having none of this, addressed Clorinda, smiling at her in an expression I recognized as preamble to a cruel jibe. He never cared what folks thought of him. “How did you get into this God business?”
She ignored the slight, laughing uproariously. “I have to remember to take your statements with a grain of sand, dear George. People like us are sent to test the waters of absolute belief. Anyway, Tobias and I sometimes call our church the Church of the Wild Oa
ts. Redemption on the road out of Sodom and Gomorrah. Tobias searched the desert, a lost man. And so did I, a bumbling sinner on the West Coast, where sin is commonplace.” She narrowed her eyes a second. “And expected and oddly celebrated. Dakota comes by his roving days honestly—a son of his mother.”
“The long trek to sainthood.” I was looking at George.
Clorinda reached across the table and patted my hand. “Exactly. How true!”
Irony and sarcasm, I guessed, were George’s province, while mine was the glib truism.
“I left Maplewood for Hollywood just around the time the Great War began. I wanted to be in the silents. You know, I’d seen a Cecil B. DeMille movie in downtown Newark, and that’s all it took. Birth of a Nation—I think it was. I was young, pretty, flamboyant, felt stifled by Maplewood and the Congregational Church we attended. My mother had died when I was ten, and my father raised me and my younger sister, Ilona. Sadly, but perhaps providentially, my father was a stern, demanding country doctor, much respected, if severe. He trucked no disobedience. This furniture”—she pointed around the cluttered room—“came from the old house on Tuscan Road.”
Tobias smiled. “When I first visited that house, I felt at peace. The glitzy Park Avenue was gone forever. This was serenity.”
Clorinda hadn’t stopped talking, and never looked at Tobias. “I fought my dear father, headed to Hollywood, acting in some forgotten silent two-reelers. The distressed maiden with the goo-goo eyes. Absurd. ‘Oh sir! I’m just a motherless lass!’ That stuff. Finally, hungry for something, I married another actor, the dashingly handsome Philip Roberts, who swept me off my feet. He’d just appeared in a William S. Hart western—he was the swashbuckling type, you know, dark, handsome, with a captivating moustache.” Her voice fell. “Then my world crashed. I was carrying our child—Philip chose the name Dakota if it was a boy, proud of his love of westerns, would you believe?—and one afternoon a streetcar jumped its tracks and struck Philip. He died weeks before Dakota was born.”